French Clash With Albanians in Kosovo Town

Published: October 16, 1999

KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Kosovo, Oct. 15—
In a shower of stones, tear gas and percussion grenades, French-led troops and foreign police officers drove back hundreds of Albanians trying to storm across a bridge to the Serbian side of this town today.

More than 100 people were injured -- none seriously -- in the two-hour melee, the most violent clash here in a month, NATO officials said.

Two Danish soldiers and five police officers were hurt, but most of the injured were Albanian demonstrators hurt by tear gas and percussion grenades fired by the NATO forces blocking them from crossing toward thousands of Serbs on the other side.

Mitrovica's Albanians say that NATO forces are keeping them from their homes, schools and a mine in the Serbian side of town. But NATO officials argue that allowing them to cross would set off ethnic violence.

''We have to tell people they have to live with other communities,'' he said in Pristina, the provincial capital, at the opening of its airport for the first commercial flight since the NATO bombing began in March. ''A difficult job is awaiting us, but we knew this when we came.''

This morning at 9, Albanians began what was scheduled to be six months of daily protests. After peacefully marching to a local mosque and a Roman Catholic church, more than 1,000 protesters tried to cross to the Serbian side of the city.

French peacekeepers first tried to use barbed wire to block their progress. They then rolled out eight armored vehicles and began firing tear gas and stun grenades. Some of the demonstrators responded by throwing stones, or heaving them with slingshots.

The Albanians made it halfway across the bridge spanning the Ibar River before the troops pushed them back.

Thousands of Serbs gathered on the other side whistling and cheering every time a percussion grenade exploded with a loud boom, scattering the Albanian stone-throwers.

The clashes ended after uniformed men of the Kosovo Protection Corps -- the successor to the Kosovo Liberation Army, which fought for independence from Serbia -- told the demonstrators to disperse.

The disturbances came as President Suleyman Demirel of Turkey arrived outside Pristina to visit Turkish peacekeepers and Turkish residents of Kosovo.

In the village of Mamusa, hundreds of residents spilled out onto the streets to greet him, waving Turkish flags.

Mr. Demirel urged the 60,000 ethnic Turks in Kosovo to live peacefully with their Albanian and Serbian neighbors.

While all ethnic groups have the right to participate in the administration of the province, he said, ''you can only obtain these rights if you overcome your differences and act in unity and solidarity.''

Photo: An Albanian Kosovar threw a tear gas canister back to French peacekeepers in a clash yesterday at a bridge in Kosovska Mitrovica, Kosovo. More than 100 people were injured, none seriously, NATO officials said. (Andrew Testa for The New York Times)